I was told that you cannot connect to the existing phone wiring if there are any phone jacks without phones connected to them -- she called these "open connections." Apparently there's also a small limit on the number of phones you can have connected. This seems to be a catch 22. Most modern houses have several jacks sprinkled around the house. You can't fill them all with phones or it will be too many phones. You can't leave them "open" for some other reason.

I have 4 regular (wired) phones, 3 cordless phones, a computer phone modem, and a ReplayTV (like Tivo) that dials up each night for the schedule.

Can I make all this stuff work.

If not, why does my cable people (RoadRunner) tell me they can make it work with their digital phone hookup?

I was told that you cannot connect to the existing phone wiring if there are any phone jacks without phones connected to them -- she called these "open connections." Apparently there's also a small limit on the number of phones you can have connected. This seems to be a catch 22. Most modern houses have several jacks sprinkled around the house. You can't fill them all with phones or it will be too many phones. You can't leave them "open" for some other reason.

I have 4 regular (wired) phones, 3 cordless phones, a computer phone modem, and a ReplayTV (like Tivo) that dials up each night for the schedule.

Can I make all this stuff work.

If not, why does my cable people (RoadRunner) tell me they can make it work with their digital phone hookup?

issue #1-I cant sugar coat this one - IT IS NOT TRUE. I do not know who told you that but they misspoke. An open connection has 0 ohms across it. A wire connected has infinite ohms. A phone is somewhere in the middle, well maybe lower than middle. The Vonage adaptor and for that matter your POTS line doesnt care if a phone is not connected. End of story

issue #2-On the other j\hand there is a limit to how many phones you CAN hookup - You can't exceed the max REN (ringer euiv number) - that many phones may be a problem. Maybe not.

However, let me put a small caution on what BG4 said. A lot of people are having issues with caller ID not working or working intermittently- see, for example, http://www.vonage-forum.com/ftopic8941.html . House wiring seems to be involved in a lot of cases, and I've yet to see an explanation that is really convincing, despite a lot of good experimentation by forum members.

Nevertheless, as BG4 said, basic functionality should not be a problem, provided you are careful in setting it up. The most important thing is to be very sure that the house wiring in disconnected from the POTS land line.

An open connection has 0 ohms across it. A wire connected has infinite ohms.

Actually an open connection is the one that theoretically will measure infinite ohms, while a shorted line (both lines connected together) will read 0 ohms across it.

bg4 wrote:

On the other hand there is a limit to how many phones you CAN hookup - You can't exceed the max REN (ringer euiv number) - that many phones may be a problem. Maybe not.

When the ring is turned off, or the ring wire disconnected in old phones, the number of remote phones can be higher. The limiting factor is the power consumed by the phones that use the power in the phone line to ring the phone. There is a limit to that power which is the max REN as you state. However, cordless phones are using the power in their battery, not the phone line, to ring, and phones with ring disabled do not put a load on the line until they are off hook. When they are off hook, the load is much lighter than the power consumed by a ring that is powered by a phone line.

i_am_jim wrote:

I was told that you cannot connect to the existing phone wiring if there are any phone jacks without phones connected to them -- she called these "open connections." Apparently there's also a small limit on the number of phones you can have connected. This seems to be a catch 22. Most modern houses have several jacks sprinkled around the house. You can't fill them all with phones or it will be too many phones. You can't leave them "open" for some other reason.

I have 4 regular (wired) phones, 3 cordless phones, a computer phone modem, and a ReplayTV (like Tivo) that dials up each night for the schedule.

Can I make all this stuff work.

If not, why does my cable people (RoadRunner) tell me they can make it work with their digital phone hookup?

We have 10 phone devices connected to a single Vonage line. There are 8 phone jacks in the house. 3 jacks are not connected to phones, while 1 jack has 6 devices (plus the Vonage service) connected to it. Ring is disabled in all but 1 phone. Of course the house wiring is disconnected from the incoming POTS line.

As others have posted, this house wiring worked fine with Caller ID until version 1.00.5x, then Caller ID stopped working. As posted in the Caller ID thread, the advanced team made some changes overnight and I am getting Caller ID once again while using the house wiring.

Vonage is definitely capable of working with lots of phones and on house wiring. The problem has been that 1.00.5x has created problems for installations that worked fine before, and customer service has had to restore values to make those system work again.